Abused migrant workers get treatment

Abused migrant workers get treatment

M. Taufiqurrahman and Multa Fidrus, The Jakarta Post,
Jakarta/Tangerang

A number of migrant workers who came home from Middle Eastern
countries on Friday are now being treated at a hospital for
serious injuries and depression allegedly the result of harsh
treatment by their former employers, an activist said on Sunday.

An activist with the Consortium for Migrant Workers Protection
(Kopbumi), who was speaking on the condition of anonymity, said
six workers were immediately brought to the police Sukanto
Hospital in Kramat Jati, East Jakarta, upon arrival at the
Soekarno-Hatta International Airport on Saturday afternoon.

"But one who was suffering from depression was forcibly
removed from the hospital by employees of recruitment agency PT
Asami Ananda Mandiri," the activist told The Jakarta Post.

Four others sustained severe bruises and concussion, while the
last one is under intensive care for symptoms of manic
depression, the activist said.

Earlier, the six admitted to reporters at the airport that
they had to return home after working for several months in Saudi
Arabia and Jordan because they could no longer cope with the
constant violence inflicted by their employers, including sexual
harassment.

Lili Kholifah, who had worked for nine months in Jeddah, said
she fled her male employer Mohammad Aloyseroi without bothering
to get her salary "because my employer had repeatedly attempted
to rape me".

Panji Krisnowo, a manpower agency staffer assigned at the
airport's Terminal III specially assigned for migrant workers,
said that on Friday alone 236 Indonesian workers arrived home
from various countries. Most of them returned as their contracts
had ended, he said.

There is no explanation as to why the migrant workers were
taken to the police hospital under tight security after leaving
the airport.

Noted sociologist Imam B. Prasodjo, who is also chairman of
Yayasan Nurani Dunia (World Conscience Foundation), said that the
plight of migrant workers was due to the government's negligence.

He said the government had no comprehensive policies regarding
its overseas workers.

"In the very early stage, there are no policies regulating the
recruitment of the workers therefore they will easily fall prey
to greedy agencies," he said, adding that most of the workers
were not given proper training prior to their departure.

In the receiving countries, lack of training and the language
barrier added to the workers' woes.

"Employers expect that the workers they hired are properly
skilled, when in fact they are women from remote villages in
Indonesia without even basic knowledge of how to turn on
electronics appliances. To make matters worse, their inability to
speak the local language is the main source of misunderstanding
that easily ends up in physical abuse at the hands of their
employer," he told the Post.